Deep Breaths
by TorScrawls
Summary: Crowley and Aziraphale gets a crash course in just how dangerous a burning church can be for a demon.


"Maybe we should go home instead?" Aziraphale asked from where he walked next to Crowley on the sidewalk. "It looks like something is going on in the city up ahead."

Crowley waved a hand lazily through the air. "Nah. I'm sure it's nothing serious. And besides, you really wanted to visit this new café."

"Yes, I did, it's just—" He cut himself off as the second fire-truck in five minutes passed them with sirens blaring.

That was when they noticed the light.

A couple of blocks in front of them something was burning; lighting up the sky in red and orange. Thick smoke could be seen rising up towards the sky but it was thankfully blowing away from their direction as it cast a dramatic shadow over the whole scene. They both stopped in their tracks.

"Well, that explains the commotion," Crowley said as he watched people running away from the fire, and a few especially brave—or stupid— running towards it.

Aziraphale looked from the people, to Crowley, and back again. "We should go help."

"We should stay out of it. It's not our problem. And besides, they seem to have it under control."

"So you can save the whole world but not a building?"

"It's not our job to step in and fix every little thing that goes wrong!"

"I know that! But this is happening right in front of us. And I," Aziraphale dramatically dusted his hands on his pants, "am going to help."

Crowley watched Aziraphale stalk off in the thickening crowd before cursing under his breath and following. He wanted to see the chaos and destruction up close, that was all.

When he came up beside Aziraphale the other didn't look at him, but Crowley could see the smile on his face and pulled a grimace in response. "Shut up."

"I knew you would come." The faith in Aziraphale's voice was sickening and Crowley's grimace deepened as they pushed past people on their way towards the flames that they could now see just above the rooftops in front of them.

"You know nothing."

"Thank you."

"Don't mention it." Aziraphale opened his mouth, no doubt to spout some more damning words for a demon, when Crowley raised his voice, "No, seriously, don't—" That was when the wind turned.

Over the years, both Crowley and Aziraphale had taken to try and emulate humans as closely as possible when they were out and about; hiding their wings, walking, no visible miracles, blinking—even if Crowley's glasses made that particular trait fairly redundant— and breathing. That last habit suddenly proved difficult when Crowley inhaled as usual, only for his lungs to violently expel the air again in a painful cough.

There was something in the air, something that made it impossible for him to breathe it, something that made it _painful _for his lungs to have breathed it in.

The cough turned into several and soon enough Crowley was hunched over in the middle of the street as Aziraphale gave a short laugh and continued walking towards the fire.

"Stop being dramatic, Crowley. It's just some smoke. We will be in and out before you know it."

"Az…phle," Crowley managed to force out as he raised a hand to uselessly grasp at his throat as his lungs tried, again and again to expel the offending air, only for more to get sucked in. He reached his other hand out towards Aziraphale, willing the other to pick up on his growing panic. As he raised his head to try and search the other's eyes out he was surprised to find his vision going in and out of focus in disorienting bursts.

"Crowley?" Aziraphale finally seemed to have noticed that something was truly wrong if the sudden fear in his voice was any indication. "Dear? What's going on?"

"C...n't brea...he" Crowley felt his knees hit the ground and two hands grab his shoulders.

"But you don't have to breathe—" Aziraphale cut himself off as the clamor surrounding them increased in volume and Crowley tried to focus his eyes and ears to understand what was going on, but he couldn't make out anything over the sound of his own wheezing and hacking attempts at breath. Aziraphale's hands on his shoulders tightened. "Oh. Oh dear."

Crowley was suddenly hauled to his feet and he stumbled slightly before an arm snaked its way under his shoulders; keeping him standing. "It's a church." Aziraphale's panicked voice said close to his ear. "The building that is burning is a church."

_Oh, _Crowley though, _that explains some things. _Like that fact that every breath his tortured lungs managed to draw burned in an almost mind-numbing way, the smoke containing enough residue of the holy building to effectively make the air poisonous to demons. _What a way to go. Choking on dust._

Crowley's thoughts were interrupted by something soft pressing over his mouth. His eyes, which he hadn't realized that he had closed, fluttered open at the contact and he saw Aziraphale pressing the sleeve of his arm over his mouth. "Stay with me. I'll get you out of here."

Crowley opened his mouth to say that _of course he would stay with him,_ but all that and out was a pathetic wheeze that he would have been embarrassed of in any other situation.

Crowley didn't need to breathe to stay alive but he did need to get the smoke out of his lungs before it poisoned him from the inside out. That proved to be hard when every breath only succeeded in making things worse.

His vision was starting to turn black at the edges and the smoke had found its way inside his glasses by now; stinging his eyes and making them water. The coughing had lessened but it had more to do with his waning strength than an increase in the quality of the air.

"Come on now, you old snake. Don't give up on me here." Aziraphale squeezed his shoulder and Crowley managed a small grunt in response. His throat had closed up too much for him to even entertain the possibility of talk.

Aziraphale kept on walking, dragging Crowley with him as he went. "You know that he'll isn't exactly happy with you after the whole fiasco with the apocalypse. It would take an awful long time for you to get a new body." _And come back to me, _went unspoken. It still made Crowley smile.

He could no longer feel the pain in his lungs, he couldn't feel a lot at all. Aziraphale kept on talking but his voice seemed to come from further and further away, until Crowley couldn't hear a thing.

The last thing he saw before darkness overtook him was the worried eyes of Aziraphale looking down at him.

* * *

The sight of Crowley slumping down completely as he lost his grasp on consciousness sent fear coursing through Aziraphale like few things ever had.

He knew that hell wouldn't be kind if they got their hands on his friend and he knew it was a real possibility that he would never see him again. He had seen the bathtub full of holy water after all.

The prospect of never again getting to see the person he had known for six thousand years was enough to snap Aziraphale out of his quiet staring.

He adjusted his grip around Crowley, made sure the other was still breathing—however faintly—and that his sleeve covered his mouth, and took off again. He walked faster than before and with a clear wish for the people in front of them to move out of their way. They did.

Crowley hung limply against his side and it was startling to see the usually energetic demon so still. He only ever seemed to relax when he was sleeping and he almost never did that when he wasn't alone—even Aziraphale had only caught his friend sleeping a handful of times over the millennia.

This wasn't as peaceful.

Aziraphale managed to get them far enough away from the fire and smoke so that it no longer stung his nose. He did his best not to look over his shoulder—not to look at the scared faces surrounding them, the reflected fire in the windows lining the street, the fire itself burning in the distance. It went against his very nature to turn his back to the church and walk away, but he knew that leaving Crowley wasn't an option. He had chosen his side and he wouldn't have it any other way.

Crowley's breathing, which had been strenuous ever since the smoke reached them, seemed to ease up slightly as they got further from the fire, but he did not regain consciousness.

Aziraphale maneuvered them into a relatively clean and completely empty alleyway just off the main street where he carefully lowered Crowley to the ground, daring to finally remove his sleeve from where it had covered the other's mouth. Crowley's head lolled to the side and Aziraphale immediately crouched down beside him to shake his shoulders in an attempt to rouse him, with no success. He froze as his eyes landed on Crowley's still chest. Was he even breathing?

"Crowley? You have to wake up now!" Aziraphale had read enough books to know the basics of how to take care of a human body and now he leaned in to place his cheek in front of Crowley's mouth. There! It was faint but still there; breaths rasping in and out of a barely moving chest.

Never in their six thousand years together had the possibility of an "end" ever really crossed Aziraphale's mind. There had always been a "next time". Looking at Crowley's unmoving body and knowing what hell was capable of on a much more personal scale put things in a different perspective and Aziraphale had to admit that he wasn't just scared—he was terrified of losing his friend.

The decision took less debating than he would ever admit as he willed a miracle to happen; forcing Crowley's chest to expel all the air it safely could in one long breath.

Somewhere along the line they had agreed to not use miracles on each other. There was always the risk of their incompatible magic doing more harm than good, and it was almost a given that using their powers on a being of the "enemy ranks" would attract more attention from their own higher ups than they were willing to deal with.

Aziraphale would gladly deal with the whole of heaven right then if it meant ensuring that Crowley stayed right where he was. It would be worth it.

Nothing happened.

The silence was deafening after all the commotion and the sight of Crowley's still body slumped against the wall made something break inside Aziraphale and he did the only thing he could think of in that situation.

He cried. He sobbed as he leaned in close to Crowley and spoke with all his heart, all the impossible emotions he couldn't voice just yet, forming a single sentence, "You can't leave me now!"

The intake of breath was sudden enough to make Aziraphale flinch backwards and land on his ass—the coughing that followed loud enough to cover up the small giddy laugh that escaped Aziraphale's mouth at the sight of Crowley's eyes flickering open.

"Crowley! Oh, I knew you would make it!"

Crowley managed to stop coughing for long enough to draw a proper breath; his eyes focusing on the face in front of him. "…Azzziraphale?"

"Yes, hello. Welcome back, dear."

"Where was I?" Crowley raised a hand to his throat; just massaging, not clutching, and Aziraphale smiled.

"Nowhere. You went nowhere."

Crowley raised an eyebrow at Aziraphale's cryptic answer, but settled for shaking his head before groaning at the action. "Ugh, I feel like shit."

"Yes, I would think so. You stopped breathing."

"You shouldn't smile as you say that."

"I'm happy you're okay." And he really, truly, was. Aziraphale had never felt so sure in his fate as he did in that moment; having had his prayers to save the life of a demon answered. If Crowley knew this he would never forgive him, so Aziraphale simply got to his feet and reached a hand down to Crowley who grabbed it and allowed him to drag him to his feet.

As Crowley got to his feet, swaying slightly and with a hand against the wall beside him for balance, he focused on Aziraphale's face and a look of concern flitted over his expression before it was quickly hidden away. That didn't stop him from asking, in a tone of voice fit for telling a horrible secret, "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine! It's you that I'm worried about. And no one will kill you for showing sympathy or worry. Not here."

"I'm not worried!" Crowley said with an indignant expression as he allowed Aziraphale to take his arm in his as they walked out of the alleyway; and if he leaned slightly on him, no one said anything about it.

As they got to the main street Crowley looked up the street towards the now diminishing flames, the fire trucks having obviously done their job, before looking at Aziraphale with an unreadable expression on his face. "You should have put the fire out to save the church."

"What? And leave you when you were suffering? I don't think so."

Crowley waved a hand in a casual manner, but his eyes were intently focused on Aziraphale as he spoke, "I was careless. Saving me isn't part of the Arrangement."

"Well, screw the Arrangement then!" The anger in Aziraphale's voice surprised them both. "I didn't save the world only to stand by and watch my best friend die soon after!"

Crowley's eyebrows had climbed up his forehead at his outburst and Aziraphale saw him open and close his mouth a couple of times before giving a rather bad impression of a casual shrug. "I guess that makes sense. In as much as anything does nowadays, at least."

"Yes, I guess so…" Aziraphale trailed off, not knowing exactly what any of this meant and not having the energy to think it through right at that moment.

He was saved from his thoughts by a gentle squeeze to his elbow and looked up to see a half smile on Crowley's very much alive face. "What do you say to tea at my place? It may not be your new fancy café, but it's the least I can do after today."

A smile spread over Aziraphale's face and he felt secure in the feeling that _this_—whatever it was they had—wasn't so easily ruined. They would always have each other. "I would love to."


End file.
